The breakdown...

So here's a close up/breakdown of my recent ornament frenzy:

Sagebrush:

Diagonal Four Patch Chain:

Aunt Dinah:

Bear's Paw:

Mosaic:

?? (I'll have to look this one up):

Wild Goose Chase:

Another one I'll have to look up:

This one, too...

Flying Geese:

Phew!  I think that's it.

27 more...

I was aiming toward making another 25, but had enough cane to make two extra--so, 27!

25 Ornaments...

I've been working on a bunch of ornaments for a client.  Here's the first batch:

some new ornaments...

I'm working up a couple of variations on my flat snowflakes.  Here's the original style:

And a style using one less slice.  I think this might be my favorite:

And this one is quite a bit smaller--only nine slices:

Thoughts?

Frank...

So March was the Emerald City Comic Con.  Last year I made Little Wolfie and the year before I made Little Vampire.  So this year:

Little Frankenstein!

He's about an inch and a quarter high.  We'll have to see what's up for next year....

A couple more bracelets...

I made a couple more bracelets that go along with the last one I made (pictured with the two new ones):

Tulips for the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival...

I made a few tulip pendants on satin cording for the quilt museum to sell during the tulip festival.  I kind of like them on a small chain, but they liked the satin cording.  They were fun to make:

It's a nice way to use up some canes....

New ornament prototypes...

I'm working on a new ornament for a client...eskimos!  Here are my first two tries:

Not quite what she was looking for.  She sent me a sketch (I can't draw for beans, but she did quite well) and I came up with this:

Better, but still not quite right.  I totally love it, though!

I'm building a bunch of quilt canes right now, so I'll get back to another try later this week.

*sigh*

A word of advice.  If  you're going to cure something while you're getting ready for work...be sure to turn the kitchen light on and put on your glasses.  Otherwise, you could see that spot on the dial that looks like the temperature mark would be revealed as a spot of flour.  So the temp is 400 instead of 275:

It's SUCH a bummer.  I was really happy with the way they turned out...the cane was beautiful and the ornaments were just like I'd envisioned them.  If I hadn't been in the shower, I might have realized they were burning and rescued them.

Oh well....

Another Clay Day, another bracelet...

I guess I still have the bracelet bug.  Here's my latest:

Quilt "Santa" Ornament...

These little (well, this one is not so little) "Santa's" are fun to make.  They're not really Santa's or Saint Nicholas's, or woodland men...I'm not quite sure what to call them.  But I think they're cute.  Here's my latest one.

He's not baked yet...I might want to tweak it just a wee bit more....

Clay Day Creations...

Sorry for being away so long...I have a health issue I've been dealing with over the past couple of weeks.  Stupid high blood pressure!  It was under control...and then it wasn't.  So I've been trying to cut back on everything, overeating & junk/fast food, stress, jobs, etc.  And I've been trying to exercise.  It all cuts into my time.

Anyway, I went to a clay day at the end of January.  I made a couple of things.  First up...another bracelet!  Big surprise!

Next up...a little house.  I found this cute cookie cutter around Christmas time at Joanne's.  I thought I'd try silk-screening on translucent clay and put a little luminary in it.  I like how it turned out--I hope you can see how it glimmers....

Multiple techniques...

I took one of the canes from yesterday and added a couple of techniques I've been playing with recently.  Silkscreen, stamps with metallic paint and cutters:

I haven't decided whether to make pins or pendants out of them....

Toad in the Puddle?

Toad in the Puddle is a fun quilt pattern.  I was playing around with some colors and...well, it's not toad in the puddle.  I have the pieces oriented wrong, so it's some other pattern and I don't have any idea what it really is.  Doesn't matter, though, because I really like the way the canes turned out:

This first one uses up some yellow, orange, and red premo that I've had lying around forever:

Well,, the beginning component is actually this:

Then I used some of my favorite colors to make this:

The cane ends for the initial component look interesting:

Kind of like a flower....


I had some leftovers, so I made these (I think I like that last one best):

Another angel...

Let's take a break from bracelets, okay?  I really like this cane. And since  I pulled it out for the bracelet (see yesterday's post), I'm inspired to make a little kimono angel with it:

A little bit of a dilemma, though...it's a wee bit too small for an ornament and a wee bit too big for a bead.  I'll figure something out....

Still obsessed...

I made a few more bracelets this weekend:

I made this first one just plain and flat; the band has a couple of colors layered into it.  It's a little rough, since the cane is an old one.  I should have smoothed it out a bit more, but I still like the way it turned out:

The second one is another take on the colorful bracelet I made a bit ago.  I made it narrower, but still used the striped lining:

This third one uses what was left of the cane I used on the Emerald Boa.  I love using my canes to make things, but it makes me sad when it's all gone:

Finally, I made this cane a LONG time ago.  It's from a quilt book (or it could be from a quilt magazine...it's so long ago, I don't really remember).  It took quite a while to make and I didn't want to reduce it to far; I would lose too much detail.  But the size works for one of the bracelet blanks that I had, so I put it together:

I'd like  to say I'm done, but I still have ideas in my head, clamoring to get out.  Maybe I'll take a break from bracelets for a day or two and make something else this week...or not!

Grow Your Blog Post - Emerald Tree Boa...

Welcome, everyone to Catrinket.  My name is Cathy and my cousin used to call me Catrinket for a nickname when I was little.  When I decided to start a blog to show off my crafting, I thought the name was perfect.  I've been working with polymer clay since 1995.  I LOVE it!  And I also love quilts (but sewing, not so much), so I merged it with my clay work and the results are here.

Quilt patterns lend themselves to caning, which is a good thing because I can't get enough of it!  It can be a bit of a problem, though...what do I do with all those canes (I probably have well over a hundred quilt canes right now?  Lucky for me, I've signed up for the year-long PCA Virtual Retreat and I've managed to find new ways to use my quilt canes in the first two lessons!  Yay!  First with Syndee Holt's bracelets, and now with Katie Oskin's animal figures.

I used some of the techniques from Katie Oskin's class to make this Emerald Tree Boa.  I'd been wondering what to do with this quilt cane--I put a border on it too soon and reduced it too far to be very usable.  But it works great for this critter!  Thanks so much for coming!!